When Nimsoft came together in 2004, I had big visions for the company. I wanted to establish the company’s technology as the standard for management of mid-market enterprises and service providers. I wanted to offer a customer experience that was second to none and to be known as the company that revolutionized the IT management space. I wanted us to innovate, to do things that nobody else had done before, to be willing to take risks…make mistakes. The next 6 years were about execution. Like any fast growing start-up there have been many challenges along the way, but we’ve always stayed true to our vision.
In the last couple of years, as cloud computing has become the architecture of tomorrow, Nimsoft has continued to innovate and now finds itself in an enviable position of pioneering new management platforms to deal with the new methods of delivering IT services. Cloud is driving disruptive change to many areas of IT and will drive disruptive change to IT management. Nimsoft will be helping drive the change, not being dragged along by it.
But, Nimsoft had a challenge to achieving our vision. The market is moving so fast and changing so rapidly, that I was concerned that Nimsoft could not, by itself, keep up. We were already hiring additional sales people and engineers as fast as we could, but there is a natural limit to how rapidly you can scale a business without breaking those things that are important to us, customer satisfaction being the top of the list.
When CA first suggested a conversation, I admit I had a brief moment of hesitation, but I quickly realized that this could be the perfect partner for Nimsoft and our customers. CA is making a commitment from the highest level of the organization to be the leader in cloud management. They recognize the importance of Service Providers and Emerging Enterprises to this new world, and they are an important focus of CA’s growth strategy. They made it clear that they want us to innovate and pioneer and add resources to accelerate those efforts.
This acquisition is transformative. I believe that the bringing together of these two companies is an event that will redefine IT management for many years to come. I am both proud and humbled by what we have achieved but most of all thankful to our employees and customers that have brought us to this place. I could not be more excited about the future and playing my small part in it.
Welcome to tomorrow…..
[...] Nimsoft, the CA deal was about resources. In a blog post, Nimsoft CEO Gary Read said: In the last couple of years, as cloud computing has become the [...]
SELL OUT!
CA turns everything to brown stuff.
Good for you. Bad for your customers. Very disappointing news.
[...] also help CA focus on “emerging national economies,” and opportunities outside the U.S. In a blog post, Nimsoft CEO Gary Read said he was initially hesitant to open talks with CA, but eventually became [...]
CA will run this great company and its products to the ground . very disappointing news !
OK I hear you. And you know what, if this were many years ago I would agree with you. Back when I was a sales executive in late 90s, taking customers away from CA was easy, because they were not well liked at all.
But, it’s 2010 and CA is a different company. When I looked at whether to recommend Nimsoft to move down this path I looked at three things: Customers, Employees and Shareholders.
For me it had to be a triple play to make sense (that’s the beauty of being a private company – you have a choice) and in my opinion this is a triple play.
I have been running Nimsoft for many years. It is a huge part of my life. Many people have taken shots at us over the years…and we have proven them wrong every time. Nimsoft is a GREAT company and will continue to be GREAT company inside CA.
All I ask is one thing…..let us prove you wrong and be open minded enough to admit it when we do.
If you think we’d have made this move if that was not going to be the case, then you don’t know me.
CA 2010 cannot be compared to the company of 5, 10 years ago. It is the most focused, visionary and customer-focused software platform leader in the world.
If I were an existing Nimsoft customer I would have a good look at the strategy of CA and be excited that in time I could become part of that vision.
Please tell us how Nimsoft will differentiate itself from any other company that became a part of CA. Please give us a preview of how customer investment in the Nimsoft product line will not be thrown away or converted to more expensive CA NSM, CEM, Spectrum and products and maintenance.
I really hope this works out for you, the employees and the customers. If it doesn’t, I don’t know who will take you seriously if you attempt another startup.
[...] involving Nimsoft making a small acquisition. Read is colorful and outspoken. Consider this line from Read’s latest blog entry, about the CA-Nimsoft deal: “When CA first suggested a conversation, I admit I had a brief [...]
For what it is worth to those that are skeptical… I am a former employee of Nimsoft and a current employee of CA. You would be surprised by the different business model CA has adopted over the last several years with their acquisitions. CA is no longer the company where products to die. Every purchase has been strategic and to fill in the gaps. Having worked for a company that was swallowed by HP in the past, CA certainly has a different approach.
Congrats to Nimsoft!
This acquisition certainly has everyone talking!!
I also must agree with J-J as a former Nimsoft employee & current employee of CA.
CA is definitely not the company Gary talks about from 10 years ago. Nimsoft customers should be excited about this acquisition & the fact they now have a technology & business partner with such a broad and deep portfolio of INTEGRATED solutions to address today’s IT complexity.
Well done Gary and team!
Gary, MarkH, et al,
Simply put, congratulations! Spot on for a job well-done!
I am proud to have worked side-by-side with you all at RiverSoft!
Now the real work begins!
Take care,
Rob
Congratulations to Nimsoft! They’ve brought to market a better solution to the real needs of managers of IT at midsized enterprise. And Gary and team have executed relentlessly while focusing on revenues and profits.
[...] http://www.nimsoft.com/blogs/?p=641 [...]
Makes me want to sneak up and dump a cooler of Gatorade over Gary’s head! CAtapult!
Gary,
This is your baby and you have the right to move in whatever direction you feel is correct.
Just keep in mind, and you mentioned it earlier CA has left a bad taste in a lot of people mouths.
Have fun on the next adventure, and don’t take any advice from Kumar.
-Open Minded
Gary,
The Nimsoft solution has found a great home with CA. It belongs with the other top shelf solutions that the CA suite is offering to organizations looking for deep dive functionality across the stack.
NMS was built to monitor Clouds since its inception – huge kudos to you and the Nimsoft developers that started all of this.
[...] also help CA focus on “emerging national economies,” and opportunities outside the U.S. In a blog post, Nimsoft CEO Gary Read said he was initially hesitant to open talks with CA, but eventually became [...]
CA is where software goes to die and that’s exactly what’s going to happen to NMS/NimBUS. CA’s only vision is to bleed the life out of a product by providing a little support & product enchancement as possible until they acquire another product which they can “integrate” into thier protfolio. I remember when NSM, CEM & Spectrum were all going to be “integrated” and these products are now considered obsolete, which is exactly what we’re going to say of NMS soon. Unfortunately this type of death comes to products which are already past thier prime, however NMS was just on the verge of penetrating the large end Market of BMC/Tivoli/Open View and had a prosperous future – now’s it’s been sold for pennies of it’s worth. Maybe there’s a hidden silver lining in this dark cloud such as the nimbus protocol itself becoming open source or the hard working developers can remain independant for product development – however again history indicates neither of these scenarios are likely. I’m not sure how the triple play works out, because it’s disaterous for your clients and can’t be good for many of your employees.
This is very disapointing.
Former & Not Future Customer.
This excellent blog by Jay Fry (ex-Cassatt) on the CA strategy and logic for their market-changing recent plays should show you MM that it’s a sunny forecast with only occasional light clouds & clearing mists
http://community.ca.com/blogs/cloud/archive/2010/03/10/ca-and-nimsoft-because-smaller-companies-have-different-it-management-requirements-but-seem-eager-for-cloud.aspx?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+CACommunity+(CA+Community+(CS))
As a colleague of Gary’s at Boole and Babbage, and having gone through an acquisition round at BMC, followed by living through the Blade Logic acquisition of BMC (!) and now as a very exited CA employee in the CA Cloud space, I can tell you that this is a great result for both Nimsoft and CA. ObliCore, NetQos 3Tera and now Nimsoft are not random acquisitions. I have seen how other acquisitions have played out in other organisations over many years and the way CA is handling itself as it grows into the Cloud space is very eye opening. Cloud monitoring and MSP support in the cloud rounds the circle for CA and they cannot afford for the acquisition to be simply “a place for Nimsoft to die” – it is too critical to the new CA story.
Well, at least CA will now be able to go head to head with BMC at this level – All they need now is a proper story around BSM, A decent CMDB/CMS, and to finally create a superset workload automation tool and they will be set to go.
Best of luck to Gary and my other friends and former colleagues at NimSoft!
Cheers
Mike
Sometimes the smaller acquired company achieving great results can transform the larger organisation to their way of doing things (culture, customer service, sales etc). A recent example would be Bladelogic/BMC. It will be interesting to see what part you play at CA Gary. Good luck.
[...] also help CA focus on “emerging national economies,” and opportunities outside the U.S. In a blog post, Nimsoft CEO Gary Read said he was initially hesitant to open talks with CA, but eventually became [...]
[...] [...]
Welcome to tomorrow….please stop. It has nothing to do with CA, since it would have sounded the same if HP, IBM, or BMC would have offered 350 million…there are always two sides to every story and opinions too…..go read “Gary’s Blog” over the past year and make your own opinion if it is “Welcome to tomorrow…”
I love the comments including the diversity of them. When you are a disruptive technology and a disruptive company like Nimsoft – differing opinions are never far behind.
I myself, despite being a giant apple fan don’t like the fact that the iPad is not going to support flash for instance – very controversial decision but, Apple is a game changer.
Suggest folks listen to the CA investor call – you can find it at http://investor.ca.com/eventdetail.cfm?EventID=78946
Listen closely to what is said.
Congrats Gary – I hope this is a lucrative deal for you, all of the Nimsoft employees, and the investors. You have a business to run – we have a business to run. Your customers are waking up this morning trying to determine the impact of this decision. Customers who took a chance on a privately-held technology company that we hoped that would not be consumed by the big fish in the magic quadrant. We are customers who are customers of CA and of Nimsoft and we made a choice. You say listen to their words; sorry we can not afford to. We have to live by their actions. Great technology comes out of mergers. Great technology gets lost in mergers. Good luck to you.. and us.
Gary congratulations to the whole team, i know alot of work has gone into getting you guys into a space where you were obviously excelling and providing value with some great technology and people.
Having been part of that time in Nimsoft and also having gone through that build with CA when they first launched TNG (it was only a number when i first worked there) i think that this is a great move and some of the inspiring pricing models that Nimsoft will bring to CA will be a great advantage to its customers
good to see United doing well last night aswell, double wammy for you, lets hope Arsenal knock you out in the next round
…….all the best
Jim Kinread makes an interesting point: I was with BEA when we acquired WebLogic and that acquisition had a profound (and positive) effect on the company — and its ability to deliver what customers were looking for. Looking forward to seeing Nimsoft’s impact here at CA. The focus Gary & team have on their customers & what they need seems to be part of their DNA, and that’s a great thing for all involved.
For those of you who have had bad experiences with CA in the past, I suggest that you owe it to yourself to take another look at the company again. I had been an employee of Computer Associates in the early 90s, left, the company I went to was purchased by Computer Associates and I left again. I left probably for some of the same reasons that you currently hold. Over the past 5 years everything has changed about them. From the name (CA) to the types of acquisitions that have been made, to the strategic direction. This is what I saw and considered before I came back to CA. Products are being invested in, Integration is a priority, and CA is taking a leadership role in Cloud computing. Don’t take my word for it, look at where CA stands in the analysts eyes these days. There is a lot of positive press these days around this. I for one am glad I am here. Current Nimbus customers have nothing to worry about. signed SkepticNoLonger
I’ve known Gary for 14 years both personally and professionally at Boole & Babbage, BMC Software, RiverSoft and Nimsoft. His “Triple Play” approach is how Gary, and the people around him, have become successful. As with any acquisition there will be a period of uncertainty. It’s now largely up to CA to take advantage of the technology and resources it has acquired. I wish all the best to my friends at Nimsoft, with special wishes to Tara, Ken and Chris.
go listen to every companies Investor call…come’on…classic comment from someone who just sold their company for 350 million dollars……It is not a CA discussion, for all the folks preaching how great CA is, there are the same number of people saying they are the same old company..
Social comments and analytics for this post…
This post was mentioned on Twitter by OnDemandBeat: M&A activity in the Cloud Computing Space is really heating up…CA announces acquisition of Nimsoft. http://short.to/1ex9e…
Oh no! Gary, years ago you personally traveled to Texas to seal the deal for our NimBus deployment. You were replacing CA UniCenter. Everyone was really pumped because every question we asked was answered promptly, every challenge we presented was met. And most important, your product worked as advertised. I fear all of your outstanding work will be erased.
Perhaps I am being too critical, but my dealings with CA products and support in the past were never pleasant. I truly hope I am wrong and Nimsoft will continue to be successful.
Hey Pat – hope you are doing well. I still remember that trip to West Texas….and the water in the restaurant at lunch (you did warn me that the water was a little “metallic tasting”….you weren’t wrong).
I understand if your past dealings with CA products and support were not pleasant. But, that is not going to be true in this case.
Because you know me personally, you also know my customer commitment and you know that is something that permeates the entire Nimsoft organization. That culture, that maniacal commitment to customer success is not going to go away; in fact it is going to continue to be built upon and enhanced.
Well Done and congrats to all the people that busted their backs to make Nimsoft what is is today my hats off to them.
I know Nimsoft from two perspectives. Five years as a customer and for the last six months as a member of the Nimsoft exec team. Here’s the deal with Nimsoft and Gary – what you see, is what you get. Pay attention to details, drive for results and execute faster (way faster) than the other guys. Have fun along the way. Transparent. And that ain’t going to change while he is at the helm of the company.
No business combination is perfect. But we’re not being acquired by CA circa 1995 or 2000. It’s March 2010! People change. Companies change. Cultures change. Sometimes – many times, for the better. Here’s what I am telling our MSP customers – Let’s keep doing what we’re doing – winning together. If we stop being who we are – then call BS on the deal. Until you see that happen, lets keep rocking.
Hi there,
i’m shure you will have a lot of fun with the cash paid by CA. But for us as a customer thats very bad news. CA is a company still behaving very badly with their customers, and so, everything will be getting more expensive while the speed of innovation will slow down.
Also, keep in mind that for some very good and well-documented reasons companys decide to work together with some suppliers — or deny to do business with particular companies. And CA is a company black-listed from many ex-customers for for their past behavior. As in my company, for example. We are Nimbus customer, but will observe the upcomming changes very closely.
Good luck to us all …
Only 350 Mill…. After all the hype and bragging from you Gary, I was expecting allot more; I am disappointed. You seem to be touting NimSoft as the KillerApp to beat BMC/IBM/HP/CA at the game they built and own. Now 350 Mill, seems like a bargain; was it your investors were no longer willing to drag out the Nimsoft journey and gave you no alternative? KillerApps usually go for allot more. HP paid 1.5billion for their perceived killer app being Opsware (Which was similar in size to Nimsoft at acquisition – just eclipsing yearly 100 mill in revenue). It seems as if either NimSoft was in allot more trouble regarding growth then you make out, or Nimsoft had a very good marketing organisation. I think it is a bit of both. Not denying Nimsoft’s solutions were sound and your customers very happy with the products that they acquired; and achieved the desired outcomes (plus more) that were promised by Nimsoft.
Now you are right CA has been forced to transform itself, especially since all the SEC problems around corruption that they have faced recently. My biggest concern is what is CA going to do with Nimsoft? The reason i make this statement is; that over the last 5 years CA has made purchases of NetQOS, Oblicore, Wily and Concord w/ Spectrum (I am sure there are others); during that time they have not paid a cent in integrating those solutions in to their legacy TNG Unicentre platform (or a new common platform). All I see is simple event integration. These purchases have been operating and selling in Silos within CA’s organisation. Is the same fate awaiting Nimsoft? Owned by CA, but not integrated in to a greater strategy? Or will something good come of NimSoft and it’s technology will be dismantled and absorbed in to a greater strategy that will bring together all of their quirky acquisitions that will potentially make BMC and IBM quiver and take CA seriously?
All the best to the Nimsoft Employees on your transition, I hope there is a place for you in CA and that you enjoyed your ride in Nimsoft and best of luck to you Gary. It has been entertaining to read your blog, very insightful.
Cheers
KDee
Hi!
Well, I’m between beeing amused and a little bit sad. Amused about the fact that CA got Nimsoft not HP,IBM, etc. That makes it easier for them, one competitor is gone, hehe… I remember the “Hurray we are above the magic horizontal Line on Gartner”-Nimsoft-Hype, lets have a look where CA resides….hmmm. Yeah an it will perfect fit together, like all PR-Guys/Girls in their comments above and in the web told. Well 350m$ nice price, enough for a fine retirement. I’m sad about the fact even time has change an CA should be an other company as we remember, I cant remember on Products on the market which runs high-fly and has a CA-Label on it, courious… it is time to proove that fact, and I am quite am sceptical. Anyway…contracts are made, between CA and Nimsoft, and Nimsoft and our company so we have to ride that horse at least till our supportcontract ends. Lets wait for e.g NMS 4.12, with nearly nothing new but logos changed :->
(sure that is all my private opinion)
Cheers
Matt
KDee, Opsware was nearly 3x trailing revs greater than Nim. Big difference. Plus, i think valuations are a bit different these days, huh? I agree with Gary, triple play Customers: Great product with commitment to run as BU, see Wily as perfect example… Employees: Get to continue to work on great products and support the best customers in the world Shareholders: Nice returns in a still difficult market, and pride of job well done…
My 2cs
Ok.. I’m not a CEO, or anyone with any wide ranging experience of the industry.. I’m just a customer. However…
…I’m personally really disappointed by the merger. To have been repeatedly told by Nimsoft in the last few years that we’ve been dealing with them, that they’re the “alternatives to the big players” and that they’re independent, very profitable and have no intentions of selling up – and then get that email in my Inbox saying that they’ve been bought out by someone like CA is.. a big let down frankly.
I’d like to be proven wrong but unfortunately I don’t really see what benefit this will bring to customers. Nimsoft already gave us very close customer support, rapid development and customization of functionality within NimBUS / NMS. NimBUS is lightweight, it’s multiplatform, and it has the benefit of being (from what I can tell) developed by a comparatively close-knit team of developers who know the product inside out. How can any aspect of what I like about the product or the (former) company ever be improved as the product is absorbed into a bigger company such as CA?
Really, really disappointed.
It’s difficult to convince with just words, it all sounds like fluff and false promises. So I thought I would share this article, that provides a factual account of what happened post (2 years) the Wily acquisition, and what actually played out.
CA is not the place where software goes to die anymore, I promise you guys (and gals)…Larry you to; CA is the place where software goes to get better:
Have a read of this report from The 451 Group, these are facts, not just fluff: http://www.ca.com/files/IndustryAnalystReports/ca_crosses_1000_customer_mark_with_wily.pdf
And if you met McCracken for yourself you would know, we mean business, this is a Jim Collins kinda guy, where failure is not an option. John stabalized us, Bill will grow us; our customers will get what their businesses, citizen’s or patients (as the case may be) want: agility and speed!
Joanne
Sure it is difficult to convince with words, if a company name like CA is associated with walking a software to his grave, anyway… we as customers have to live with it, and you as CA with the BU nimsoft has to proove that your commitments arent just fluffy words. Hehehe… but I think, no I think I know, if this deal nimsoft/ca-deal would be anounced 2 months ago,, my boss had never ever got his sign under a contract for NMS, even if the product looks and works perfect, because its CA. And from my point of view, I think the rising star of the NMS sales will make some “wait cycles”, or every existing CA cutomeris forced to switch to NMS, than the numbers on the papers for installed systems might be rising, but new customers… well difficult to change an company image, doh….
But to bring my sadness to an end, I love surprises, and I would love to beeing absolutely wrong with my concerns :->
(naturally this all is my own personl opinion)
Cheers
Matt
[...] a part of the Big 4 which has to translate to Big Problem. You have only to read the comments on Nimsoft CEO Gary Read’s blog post on it to see the reaction is not great. BTW, look at the comments from Nimsoft customers, not the ones by CA employees – as if I had [...]
Science who?
Last news article – May, 2009
Last press release – Oct, 2009
Julia, Marketing VP? Really?
this is probably one of the best post by Joanne…..post a link to CA’s web page for a white paper written by The 451 Group…..the article is 2+ years old and CA wouldn’t post it if it wasn’t flattering…….Nimsoft was a dynamic company with the ability to meet customers demands on the fly, had excellent customer support, and many benefits of dealing with a small business…..now compare this to CA’s process and support, which is no different from HP, BMC, or IBM…just go ask the Bladelogic customers…. CA, like all Big 4 companies, have to comply to specific process and regulations that didn’t limit Nimsoft…..
Phil (author of the comment above and two others in this discussion), how about a bit of full disclosure so that your comments have a clearer context. From the looks of your originating IP address I can see that you have an affiliation with the competition, Hewlett Packard, HP.
Phil: the point is, while it is flattering, it is a 3rd party snapshot of what happened 2 years post the Wily acquisition: growth (doubled number of customers, enhanced features, happy customers). And frankly we’ve grown Wily even more since then and popped out a couple of more releases. Gary’s company is strategic to us, and will have a huge impact on so many aspects of our business…may actually create fundamental change in a few areas, so you can bet we are going to keep the momentum he started and learn from it! But again, just words…best thing to do is wait and see. Oh and if you are the competition: look out! Software is not a sideline at CA!